bike culture blogged

The 10th annual Downhill & Messenger challenge is Friday August 4th. This legendary race starts at the Church of Bicycle Jesus and goes somewhere downhill really freakin’ fast. The race should offer all the thrills and spills of Nascar without the internal combustion, of course.

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Added to the list of things I’ve done on a bike is “unplanned ride with Critical Mass.” Pam and I were riding, stopped at an intersection and here comes one big horde of cyclists – it was the last Friday of the month. So, what else to do then join them! It was mostly an orderly ride, lots of mashup bikes, no arrests like the last time, fun, and when they turned left back into the city, we kept going straight and towards home. Later on the bike path, I talked to a commuter that had just given up his car, citing Peak Oil and had also just ridden with Critical Mass. He thought it was great and I thought I wasn’t sure how effective making already angry drivers angrier was.

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A reader submitted Bikely today, a site that “helps cyclists share knowledge of good bicycle routes.” Bonus about bikely is that you can just say, “check bikely!,” when asked repeatedly how to get on the i90 loop.

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I used to hate bike paths. I was a vehicular cyclist, and an adherent of John Forester’s Effective Cycling. I used to snicker at people driving to trailheads, $3,000 Serottas strapped to their bumper.

The nearest bike path to my house is poorly implemented, with dozens of industrial pull-outs crossing the path, and some weird traffic rules (including the only intersection of any kind I’ve ever seen where you have to yield to traffic approaching from behind you). The very existence of said path meant that riders who choose to ride on the wide, smooth, uninterrupted roadway that’s immediately adjacent are harrassed by drivers who think they should be on the crappy path.

A few years ago, between gigs, I started riding the Silver Comet regularly. On Wednesdays, I would do a hard 50-miler, iPod blasting, with the trail to myself once I got 7-10 miles out from the trailhead. My daughter spent a lot of her Burley Piccolo phase on the trail. There’s a real sense of freedom and safety that accompanies being separated from the constant interaction with cars and drivers.

So it was a shock to read that a 54-year-old woman riding on the Silver Comet was abducted and murdered Tuesday, and her body found just off the trail on Wednesday. I didn’t know Jennifer Ewing, but she’ll be missed, as will that sense of safety on the trail.

Police have a suspect in custody, a 43-year-old who was on probation for a 1991 rape. He has yet to be charged but “investigators believe that an arrest is forthcoming.”

Police patrol the trail occasionally in golf carts, and say there have been only 3 crimes reported along the trail since the start of 2005. Nevertheless, they recommend riders couple up, carry cell phones, and exercise caution.